Category: Recipe

Peanuts

I love the Japanese name for peanuts: 落花生, it fits so well the way peanuts actually grow! But before living in Japan I never really considered peanuts as a food or a cooking ingredient. I am not into peanut butter either. But when a friend told me why they were called 落花生 and how they grow, I got intrigued, and even more, knowing that Chiba is famous for its peanuts!

So I decided to grow some in the garden, and see by myself how they grow. Loved it! And so cooking peanuts needed to start. Of course salted boiled is my way to go, but instead of just eating them as snack, today I got creative and came up with a new super simple recipe, that was also super delicious.

Stuffed eggplants (1 serving)

  • 3 small eggplant or one large
  • 100g of cottage cheese
  • 80g of boiled peanuts
  • Salt and pepper

Wash the eggplants, cut in two in the long edge and grill until soft.

Shell the peanuts and chop roughly with a knife, stir in with the cottage cheese.

Spread the mix on the eggplants. Grill again for a few minutes until it starts getting golden. Serve, top with salt and pepper. Enjoy!!

Chilled miso soup

You may be very much used to miso soup as a warm bouillon served either with just a few things in: a slice of shiitake, a peel of yuzu, a few leaves of mitsuba, or with rather plenty of small mushrooms, daikon…

But with the summer heat, a chilled soup is very much welcome and a chilled miso soup version is also possible and it’s delicious!

It just requires to prepare a little ahead so that the bouillon can cool down. This recipe is inspired by a soup we were served for lunch at a small vegan cafe we went for lunch to on our way back from Hoki Museum (by the way, well worth the visit).

My recipe features somen, the Japanese vermicelli, but you do without.

Chilled miso soup (2 servings)

  • 1 dry shiitake
  • 1 small eggplant
  • 2 tsp of miso
  • 1 small cucumber
  • 4-6 leaves of fresh green shiso
  • Optional: 100g of somen
  • Optional: 1 fresh myoga

In a pan boil 1l of water, add the dry shiitake to make a shiitake dashi. Let it boil for a few minutes, when the color goes brownish, turn off the heat and leave it to rest.

Cut the eggplant in bites and bake it or cook it in a frypan until soft.

Wash and slice very thinly the cucumber and the shiso, and the myoga of you use any.

Boil the somen and keep them in cool water.

In the serving bowls, serve one spoon of miso each, top with the drained somen, add the eggplant, the cucumber and eventually myoga, finish with bouillon that covers almost everything, and add the shiso.

For extra chill effect, add a few ice cubes and enjoy!

Summer green chilled soup

Last week we went out for dinner to try Cimi Restorant, a restorative kitchen that proposes an interesting concept, with only 10 guests all sitting at one table, in an old house, redesigned for the restaurant, in a mix of old and new. Most dishes are plant based. All the dishes they served were very simple, using a few ingredients very carefully chosen, from farms producing organic, biodynamic or in permaculture. Though I was a bit confused that they do not use more local ingredients as part of reducing the environmental footprint and being furthermore restorative.

One of the plant based on the course menu was a cold cucumber soup. And it was obvious after the very first spoon that it was not just cucumber, there was also some green bell pepper and a few other vegetables. It was refreshing and very tasteful.

Perfect timing, last Sunday we got some cucumber from a lady with whom we played tennis, and I had just bought green bell pepper. So I decided to try a simpler version if that soup at home. The result was way over my expectations at first try! So here is my recipe.

Summer green chilled soup (2 servings)

  • 2 Japanese cucumbers (or one European)
  • 2 green bell peppers
  • 1/2 cup of vegetables consommé
  • Salt and pepper
  • Optional: olive oil and a slice of sourdough bread

Prepare the vegetables consommé and let it chill.

Wash the vegetables. Cut the stems and remove the seeds of the bell peppers, and of the cucumber if it feels like that (not necessary with Japanese cucumbers).

Put the vegetables and the consommé in a blender and liquify. Dress in adequate plates or bowls. Top with z pinch of salt and freshly ground pepper (I used a mix of pink and white peppers).

If you feel like it add a drizzle of olive oil. Or cut the slice oc sourdough bread in bite size and roast them in a bit of olive oil in a pan. Top the soup.

Enjoy!

Insalata di riso – インサラータ・ディ・リーゾ

In France, the early summer is the end of the school year, and more than often children go on day trips. In which case parents should provide a lunch box. I have no idea what today’s lunch boxes look like, but when I was a child (saying that feels like I 80 years old or something!!!!), one very popular recipe for the lunch box was “rice salad”. There were two main versions: the cheese and ham one, usually with mayonnaise dressing, and the tuna one either with mayonnaise or olive oil. I personally liked the later best. With a piece of fresh local bonito, some cooked rice, and summer vegetables plenty, the menu for dinner tonight was all set: it would be a classic rice salad. Of course rice is a key ingredient in the recipe and I wasn’t sure it would work well with Koshihikari rice, but it is truly perfect.

For the other ingredients, that would be normally can-ready food: corn, tuna… but I don’t by much canned food, and it is the season for delicious local corn now. And it makes a much much better meal. Almost fancy!

Here is my recipe.

Rice salad (2 servings, one dish meal)

  • 1/2 cup of rice
  • 1/2 fresh corn
  • 1/2 filet of fresh bonito
  • 1 tomato
  • 1/2 cucumber
  • Olive oil
  • Salt and pepper
  • 1 leave of laurel

First, cook the rice, and boil the corn.

In a pan set the bonito filet, some olive oil and salt, pepper, laurel add a little of water and cook slowly under cover.

Dice the tomato and the cucumber.

In a large bowl, set the rice (much better if it has had time to cool down. Generously splash olive oil and stir. Add the tomato and the cucumber. Stir again. Once the corn is cooked and had cooled down, add the husked corn, pull the bonito, like you would do with pork and add too. Stir, add salt and pepper if you feel it’s needed. Enjoy at room temperature or chilled.

A close up of the finalized salad

Zucchini season!

It’s been a long time since I last wrote here. I’ve been cooking as usual of course, but nothing that deserved a special entry. Until today. Inspired by a giant zucchini I bought for 100JPY at the farmers market, I decided to use it for a soup. I love mint and zucchini soup, and the mint is spreading at a very fast pace in the kitchen garden, so I was all set, until I realized that “just” a zucchini soup won’t make the trick for an active day, and we needed a little more.

But what…

I just had pork meat and opted for pork mint croquettes, and with a piece of bread left over a couple of croutons. Something that could be largely inspired by Italian meatball soup, but my way.

And it was damn delicious, so much that I really want to keep the recipe and do it again and again!!!

Zucchini meatball soup (2 servings)

  • 1 extra large zucchini or 2 normal size
  • Fresh mint (10 leaves)
  • 100g of ground pork
  • 23bs of panko
  • 1 egg
  • More fresh mint (10 leaves)
  • A piece of left over bread
  • A bit of oil for cooking
  • Salt and pepper

Wash and cut the zucchini, steam it until soft. In a blender, put the steamed zucchini, and 10 leaves of fresh mint rinsed. Blend until liquid. The soup is ready. Keep at room temperature.

In a bowl, chop 10 leaves of fresh mint, add salt and pepper, the ground meat, the egg, the panko. Stir well.

Heat a pan, add some oil for cooking, make bite size patties and cook them on both sides until golden.

Cut the bread in small bite size and toss them in the pan, turn until golden.

Serve the soup, add the meat balls and croutons and enjoy!

Making the meat balls.

Cauliflower pasta

It’s the season for cauliflower and I am a big fan, so it always makes me happy to prepare some.

Until recently I would either eat it raw, steam it to melty-crunchy, or make a puree or a soup for some classic recipes. Or use Indian inspiration and cook it with spices.

Yet this year I started to make a sauce for pasta with it, like you would with broccoli. My first attempt was good but needed a bit more elaboration. My attempt today reached the perfection I was expecting. So here is my recipe. Simple but so delicious.

Cauliflower pasta (for 2 servings)

  • 120g of dry short pasta (I used farfalle, but penne, macaroni etc… would work very well)
  • 1/2 cauliflower
  • 2tbs of olive oil
  • Salt, pepper, turmeric, paprika

Boil the pasta. Steam the cauliflower until very mushy.

In a pan, puree the cauliflower and add the olive oil and the salt, pepper, turmeric and paprika, a pinch of each. Stir well. Add the cooked and drained pasta, stir to obtain a well mixed mix. Serve.

You can add grated parmesan on top if you like it.

Home alone experiments

While A. is on business trip while my days at work are super busy, I’m oscillating between experimenting new recipes and easy to prepare but very satisfying food such as cheesy toasts and ochazuke… In my experiments, the sweet potatoes gnocchi with a 100% sesame pairing was definitely a huge hit! It mixes perfectly a traditional Italian recipe with Japanese flavors. A must try if you love sweet potatoes and sesame. Bonus, it is one of the easiest recipe ever… and here it is!!!

Sweet potato gnocchi and sesame (two servings)

  • 1 large sweet potato
  • Flour
  • 1tbs of sesame seeds
  • 1tbs os sesame oil
  • Salt and pepper

Steam the sweet potato. When tender let it cool down. Peel it and mash it. Add flour little by little to obtain an almost non sticky dough. Shape the gnocchi. In a pan boil 1-2L of water and poach the gnocchi. Drain and serve in plates, top with a bit of sesame oil and sesame seeds, add salt and pepper. Eat immediately.

A little magic with pasta leftovers

Every morning A. goes to work on site I prepare him a lunch box. I like to cook lunch early because then I know that my portion is also ready and I can eat any time, even when my schedule is super tight, which is more than often the case recently. When it comes to preparing our lunches and it includes pasta, I love to use fresh pasta because they cook very rapidly. The issue is that the brand of fresh pasta I like most has portions that are too big for one and too small for two… so today was one of this day, where I put 2/3 of the portion to A. lunch box, and I ended up with a sort of leftover size of pasta… not enough to feed me until dinner which would be late (again) today. Luckily I had gyoza skin in the fridge (for dinner) so I decided to pick 4 pieces and add these to pasta… but how???

I realized that Asian food often mix dumplings and noodles in soups, so I decided to go for something like that except that it wouldn’t be Asian, but rather Italian like for me, with fresh mozzarella dumplings. And this is how the most delicious thing I have cooked in a bit was born. Too delicious not to share with you my recipe! I used the leftover pasta and the gyoza skin I love most, but you can use fresh pasta and make your own gyoza skin, it is super easy… I was cooking while on a meeting, so I used minimal time.

Dumplings and noodle soup (1 serving)

  • 50g of leftover noodles or the equivalent to cook
  • 4 gyoza skins (you can make your own, it is super easy and rapid too)
  • 1/2 fresh mozzarella
  • 1 leek
  • a few mushrooms ( I used shimeji)
  • thyme
  • salt and pepper
  • olive oil

Cut the leek in the size/shape you like, same with the mushrooms.
Cut the mozzarella in 4. In each gyoza skin, put a piece of mozzarella, a bit of thyme and pepper. Wrap.
In a pan add 500ml of water, the leek, the mushrooms and cook for 5minutes after it boils. Add the noodles, the dumplings and cook for another 5minutes. Serve, add thyme and olive oil and eat while it is hot!

A savory pie with Japanese flavors

There’s no secret here, I love all sorts of stuffed food: dumplings, ravioli, gyoza, pies and all the others. And I cook some almost every week. Last week I was set to cook an okonomiyaki, I had the Chinese cabbage, the pork meat and dinner was all set. But then, A. reminded me that we had scrambled eggs for breakfast and then an okonomiyaki would mean eggs again (since when does he care???) so I just acknowledged and said, well then, let’s remove the eggs from it and that’s gonna be a pie!!! (I am not the only big fan of pies and dumplings, A. is always OK!)

So here I am now thinking about how to make it happen. And it turned out to be fairly simple and simply delicious. Here is my original recipe.

Okonomiyaki style pie (2 servings as main)

  • For the pie crust
    • 200g of flour
    • 20cl of vegetal oil
    • 10cl of soya sauce
    • Water
  • For the filling
    • 1/2 Chinese cabbage
    • 100g of ground pork or chop filet
    • a handful of katsuobushi flakes

Mix all ingredients for the dough. Add water little by little to obtain a smooth and non sticky dough. Let is rest a bit.

In the meantime, chop the Chinese cabbage and put it in a pan with the meat and cover. Cook at medium heat for 5-10 min, then remove the cover, add the katsuobushi and cook until all the water from the cabbage is gone.

Roll the dough for your pie dish, with amply enough to be able to make the cover by folding it it. Set in your pie dish and fill with the filling, fold the dough to close the pie. Bake at 200 degrees until dough is golden.

That’s it!

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